Happiness is Hungry

As I sit here, watching a movie I don’t understand and eating banana chunks off a fork, I realise something. I realise that even the 80’s ballads emanating from the kitchen, on the other side of the wall, can’t draw me from my shell. This shell of mine is a defence mechanism; a protective barrier and it’s the only thing sheltering me from dangers outside. Outside of my own bubble the dangers of the world taunt and tease.

The way I see it; you settle down some place that reminds you of home, form deep and meaningful attachments to people, pouring yourself into them through a bond made on the basis of trust and respect. Happiness is your friend and it feels like an eternal friendship. It is upsetting then, to think that the day will inevitably come, when you feel nothing but confusion. You’ll be lost and alone, forced to sleep on a cold mattress and wake up to a day identical to the one before. This is because slowly, people begin to leave and take with them the pieces of you, you trusted them to nurture and love. You are now cracked, the void’s depth growing. The gaps are gaping.

Even your eternal friend, happiness, has deserted you by this point. This is because it is a hungry monster. A twisted sadistic monster that requires you to feed it a continuous stream of those happy chemicals; dopamine, serotonin and oxytocin, in order to trigger a pleasant response, that we as humans are expected to exhibit all day, every day. Only then will we be ‘happy’ or ‘successful’. Only once we have our social, personal and professional lives in-line, will we truly be a deserving individual; deserving of happiness, success (and love).

It is this realisation of mine – this single, soul crushing thought– that frightens me. I’m terrified of what I will never become. I’m terrified of what I cannot give to this dangerous yet fearful world. But, most of all, I am terrified that someone as unhappy as me will live without truly knowing the meaning of; love and even more so, pure happiness. The kind of happiness that emanates from a baby’s laughter, that shines from an Olympic athlete lifting their first gold medal, or the face of a groom in love who’s mesmerised by his bride gliding down the aisle towards him.